WASHINGTON — The Armenian Assembly of America (Assembly) welcomes a newly issued report Justice Under Pressure: Independence of Lawyers and the Right to a Fair Trial in Azerbaijan by the International Commission of Jurists (ICJ) regarding Azerbaijan. The ICJ is an international non-governmental organization of leading judges and lawyers working to promote human rights and the rule of law across the globe.
The ICJ report has produced a detailed and meticulous exposition of structural and institutional flaws in the Aliyev regime’s entire justice system with specific application to those flaws in the trials of the former Nagorno Karabakh officials, globally considered as political show trials without any real legal basis. The ICJ’s findings provide timely and crucial insight into the domestic situation in Azerbaijan, which directly affects the lives of Armenians and poses a threat to long-term regional stability.
The analysis pays particular attention to the Azerbaijan government’s control of criminal defense and all other lawyers but also details with citations the authoritarian control exercised by the regime over all aspects of the criminal process. This begins in the pretrial stages, includes access to materials and to imposition of government-controlled defense counsel, and runs through interpretation/translation control, prosecutorial control, retaliatory discipline, torture, and detention conditions.
“In the context of its newly released report examining the independence of the legal profession in Azerbaijan and assessing its impact on the right to a fair trial, the Justice Under Pressure: Independence of Lawyers and the Right to a Fair Trial in Azerbaijan provided the most detailed and credible exposition the facts, circumstances and legal analysis concerning what are widely acknowledged as show trials of the 23 political and civilian Armenian Christian hostages seized from Nagorno-Karabakh by the Aliyev regime. The report’s credibility is preceded by the ICJ’s stellar reputation as an independent body and enhanced beyond reproach by its level of detail from public and confidential sources,” said Assembly Executive Director Bryan Ardouny.
“The Assembly and all those concerned about justice not only welcome this work and thank the Commission but also urge governments to stop turning a blind eye to the fate of these hostages and the destruction of Armenian Christian presence in Artsakh and elsewhere and take concrete action. We also extend our hope that the same shortcomings are cured for the benefit of Azeri citizens suffering from the same dictatorial regime and repeat our calls for the United States Government to implement and enforce existing sanctions on anti-terrorism, genocide prevention and other laws as written and supported by the American people.”
The report concludes with recommendations to the Aliyev government of Azerbaijan, the government prosecutors, Azerbaijan’s Parliament, and to the Council of Europe. As was widely reported, President Aliyev defiantly announced that Azerbaijan suspended respect for decisions of the European Court of Human Rights, and because of its well-documented abuses and genocidal pattern Azerbaijan is no longer a member of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe. The autocracy also severed ties with the European Parliament following the EU’s recent resolutions calling for the immediate release of the NK trial hostages. Earlier this month, President Aliyev, speaking by video at the European Political Community Summit, used what should have been a forum for peace to rehash failed arguments rationalizing his genocidal policies.
